


bred in decency and order

by OkayAristotle



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Concussions, Cuddling & Snuggling, Gen, Hot Chocolate, Hurt/Comfort, Jason Todd Needs A Hug, Minor Injuries, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2020-01-01 03:27:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18327695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OkayAristotle/pseuds/OkayAristotle
Summary: “Sorry.” He mutters. Like there's anything to apologize for. “I just—" he tugs the trashcan close again, breaths coming heavy for a minute before he pushes it away. “Your place was closer than mine.”





	bred in decency and order

**Author's Note:**

> Full and fair warning: I finished and posted this while sick. Also, it's been a while since I've posted anything. Oops.

There's blood on his pillow. All he can think, really, is that Alfred will have a stern lip for him in the morning. None on the sheets, when he checks, and the comforter is clear.

It's only a few specks, so he strips the pillow and turns it over. Fits it back on, and then carefully arranges it beneath the rest. It'll take Alfred at least a day to find that. More than long enough for Bruce to dab some hydrogen peroxide on the mark, scrape it out. 

But— there's blood on the pillow. And a little on the floorboards. And he knows, how he always does. Trails his way to the study in the East Wing, picks up two steaming mugs on his way. One piled high with cream, the cheap kind that Alfred side-eyes him for but never speaks a word against because—

Because Jason's there. Here. Slunk in like a cat, guilty for roaming the neighbourhood past his dinner. His eyes are slits in the dark when Bruce elbows the door open, head tilted to one side and propped against his palm.

Moonlight illuminates the room, well beyond midnight. Blood on his desk. Mahogany. That will be a bitch to scrub out. The staining alone will be a headache. It will be worth it.

Jason takes the mug silently, covers the stain with the rim gently. He wonders if that's on purpose, when he's still bleeding over Bruce's orthopedic desk chair, and his eyes are still slits— spaced and red, irritated.

“You're helping me clean, tomorrow.” Bruce comments. Sets his own mug beside Jason's, comes around the edge of the desk quietly. Jason tracks him a beat too slow. “And you're concussed.”

“Oh? Really?” Jason mutters. “Hadn't noticed.” His head tips further, this time forward, just in time to rest against the fabric of Bruce's sweater. “I'm going to be sick. I'd apologize but I—"Bruce leans left, picks up the waste paper basket in time to rescue his shoes.

Jason's always been a loud vomiter. Big, hacking coughs. It had shocked him the first time. Fingers against his jaw to turn his head and save the boy an early death, bent over the window of the Batmobile on the corner of his first triple-homicide. Jason had slapped his hands away, snapped between bouts of hurling, “Fuck off, old man, ‘m fine.”

He'd spent a good hour checking the boy's lungs, anyway.

It still shocks him, if he's being honest. But he leaves him to it, watches his ribs expand and collapse at an alarming rate and the wet, unsightly splatter against the bucket. Jason pushes the trashcan away, groans, spits and misses.

“Sorry.” He mutters. Like there's anything to apologize for. “I just—" he tugs the trashcan close again, breaths coming heavy for a minute before he pushes it away again. “Your place was closer than mine.”

It might be the truth. It could be, it has been in the past. Even out here, up on private land almost a mile out of the city. He doesn't really care if it is the truth. Jason's head is still pressed to his hip.

“Jeez, who knew Croc hit so hard, huh? ‘Course, probably shouldn't have said he wasn't pretty.” He spits again, making it to the bucket. “Think I hurt his feelings?”

“I think Waylon can handle it.”

“Maybe there's a sensitive soul inside that man. Lizard.”

“Reptile.” Bruce corrects gently. “Crocodiles don't have secondary palates or overlapping scales.”

“Mm.” Jason sighs. Wipes his mouth. “You gonna move, or should I try and drink that through your beer gut?”

Bruce squints. “Jason.”

“What.”

“You've gained three pounds since I last saw you.”

“How do you even—" he clicks his teeth together. “You are _so_ creepy, you know that, right?”

“It's been mentioned once or twice.”

There's something muttered that would probably have a handful of change dropped in the swear jar. The fact that they have it, still, shows just how often this happens.

It's still not often enough.

Bruce swallows. It feels wrong, just thinking it. There's blood on his pillow. On his desk. On his fingers, when he pushes the white streak of Jason's hair to the side, a healing gash across his skull.

He hadn't meant, by any measure, that he wants this. Never this. But—

But Jason's seeping warmth into his stomach, through layers of cotton and cashmere. He hasn't moved, hasn't done anything but sit, breathing shallow, with Bruce. Sliding his way through — presumably — Bruce's bedroom window, touching his pillows, slumping in his study.

“You got a light?”

Bruce startles. “I don't smoke.” It's a lie. Jason's _seen_ him smoke. But it's second nature by now to spout the lie. Alfred always put extra sugar in his coffee when he doesn't.

Something about— About being a good role model. Back when Jason had resorted to checking perp's pockets when he thought Batman wasn't looking (he was, he saw, he was not a good role model.) and hanging out the West Wing attic window, late at night after the electric of patrol. He'd been so small, back then, and worked his way through half a pack in a night.

“Not that— Jesus, I meant a pen light. For my fucking eyes.” And then he turns his head, sits back with a hiss and snaps, “Yes, you do.”

“I do.” Bruce allows. Smiles, just a hint, and it gets the reaction he wants; Jason huffing a laugh in the dark, the tension between his eyebrows melting away for just a moment.

“Still scared of Alfie?” And he hears it, clear as day: _How is he?_

“We should all be scared of Alfred.” _He's good. Always good._

Jason nods. Blood drips down his forehead, sluggish. An old wound. Enough to coagulate and therefore not be a worry. Nothing feels like a worry, right now.

Reluctant to move, to do anything to disturb their silence, Bruce rummages through the locked draw of his desk. Fishes the light out and clicks it on, off, on again. Jason tilts his face up, offering.

His jaw is sharp when Bruce takes it, holds him steady with a touch that's so gentle he barely feels the boy under him. Man. And isn't that— just, fucking funny? (And he can hear it now, without speaking, Jason insisting that _those years_ don't count and therefore, he's only twenty.)

Bruce flashes the light in his eyes. Jason hisses but doesn't move, chin against the palm of Bruce's hand. (When he'd said it, it had sounded petulant. Bruce had thrown his newspaper down and stalked off.

Now it just sounds desperate.)

Against his best reasoning, maybe it's the late hour or the way moonlight makes everything feel fuzzy, out of focus and immaterial, he runs a thumb across Jason's cheek. There's no stubble there, and that's a point of contention among most of his sons: they can't grow beards.

It warms him, slightly, just thinking of the way Dick had bounced on his feet and waited for the fateful day when Bruce could show him how. How Tim had already known, somehow, but it wasn't necessary. And Jason had—

Jason hadn't ever gotten to that point. He'd been in the ground long before he'd ever had the chance to steal Bruce's kit and try for himself. And now that he's back, he seems frozen in that respect.

His cheek is smooth, warm. Sticky with blood. “You'll be fine.”

“I knew that.” He mutters. Moves away, taking all his heat with him. “Do me a favour and get my boots off. Think if I bend I'll hurl again.”

Bruce nods, and slides to one knee silently. It's still dark, darker than before down here, and he's gentle when he takes Jason's foot. Cradles it between his thighs.

There's blood on the stitching, blood on the heel and the rubber teeth. Blood on his sweats, soaking in slowly, taking its time the same way he does; unlacing at a pace, tugging the double-knot free. His fingers find Jason's heel, swollen and hot, and he cradles that too as he slides the boot off.

Repeats for the other boot, and hears the faint sigh as Jason sips his cocoa. It's not as good as Alfred makes it, but he'd been told once that made it better.

(“It's rustic.” Jason had said, kindly. “Alf's stuff belongs on T.V.”)

“You need ice.” Bruce mutters. If his voice is rough, worn down, that's his own business.

Jason wriggles his toes. “Later, old man.”

He sighs. “Jason.”

“I didn't _die—"_ and that slices, always fucking slices, and he wants to trash the study around them both, “—to be done in by a sprain. I'm fine, and I'm not moving.”

“I can—”

Jason lifts his foot, as if to prove a point, and taps Bruce's knee. “No. Shut up, no. You're not leaving.”

“Jay,” he rumbles, looks up for the first time. His desk chair is done for. Jason's got it pushed back to a sharp angle, almost a recline, head tipped back. His eyes are still slits, blue but almost green in the light.

“If you leave,” the boy (because fuck, he's still that. Until the day he di—) murmurs, as though he's reading the weather forecast. “I will tell Alfred it was you who dropped raspberry ripple ice cream on his favourite velour rug.”

“You wanted the ice cream.” He says, blank.

“But it was you who dropped it.”

“You—" he shuts his mouth. “Okay.”

He shifts, grunts, and blood seeps from his shirt. Bruce leans up, brushes the jacket away to see. Nothing big enough to cause concern, a scrape if anything. Jason raises an eyebrow. “Are you staying there all night?”

He blinks. And, yes, he's still between the boy's thighs. There's blood on his sweats and his— there is his son, in the dark, bleeding across his ergonomic, possibly favourite, chair. “No.”

Jason snorts. “‘No.’ He says. Like there was any other option.” Without seeing, Bruce knows his eyes are rolling. “Get up here, old man. I'm fucking cold. Do you ever turn the heating on?”

“The heaters turn on at six.” Bruce says, puts his hands on Jason's knees to push up.

“It's baltic.” He huffs out, one hand rubbing over the other.

“It's most likely blood loss.” Bruce says. Finds himself sweeping that shock of white hair out of the way, again, fingers in the soft strands before he knows what he's doing. And it always— it's always like that. Always like that, here. In the study or the bedroom or the kitchen at four in the morning, wherever Jason shows up, whenever Jason shows up.

Jason hums. In agreement or enjoyment, he's not sure. After a moment of silence he stands, leans hard against the desk beside Bruce. His ankle must be in agony, but Jason smiles with all his teeth. “Your throne, Your Majesty.”

Bruce watches him blankly. “It's covered in blood.” He huffs a sigh. Leans down to adjust the height and then pull the backrest up, giving it a spin to make sure it won't fall apart. “And dirt.”

Jason shrugs. “Specifically from the quarry up by Blackgate.”

Bruce takes his seat back, taking a moment to get comfortable. “Not Croc's usual hideout.” Which, no. But he's thankful it's not toxic sewage, otherwise they wouldn't be talking. He'd be stripping Jason and spraying him down like a disgruntled cat.

“It wasn't Croc.” Jason falls rather than sits, a heavy, uncontrolled weight. Ignoring Bruce's soft _oof,_ he continues quietly, “Had a busy night.”

“So I can see.” Against his will, his hands find Jason's hips. Gentle, he resettles him until the boy's square on his lap rather than crushing one thigh, acutely aware of how fast he's catching up to Bruce. “Take it easy, Jay.”

“Oh, right,” he mumbles, leans forward to snatch up his mug again, “like you do, right?”

“Do as I say, not as I do.” He says, rote. “Maybe then you'll be able to walk in the morning.”

There's silence. Because, of course there is, he shouldn't have—

“That bad?” That white streak tickles his jaw, Jason's head turning slightly before he settles again, a steady weight against Bruce's chest. It's more comforting than he ever could have imagined.

The boy had always weighed like a bag of bricks, even starving and desperate. It had been comforting then, and it was comforting now. His boy was sturdy, a constant reminder that he was _there_ — here.

Bruce swallows. “My back's acting up. That's all.”

He'd never say it to Dick, he'd get that _look_ Dick has, like he can't possibly continue living unless Bruce personally spends fourteen days in bed. And God forbid he mention it to Tim; he'd either have every orthopedic specialist at his doorstep within the day, or lock himself away for a week and pretend it wasn't happening.

And Damian— well, Damian is ten. He'd probably just tell Alfred, who'd do all three options at once.

Jason laughs. A deep, wheezing laugh, shoulders shaking against Bruce's chest, enough that he has to wrap his arms close around the boy's waist unless he slides off. “Oh, yeah? That time already?”

“My back was broken, Jason.”

The boy hums. Laughs again, quieter this time. He turns his head, speaks right against Bruce's collarbone, cheek warm. “Please tell me there's a Bat-Zimmer on the way. Please, Dad, _tell me_ —”

“I can — and will — ban you from this household, Jason.” The word — and what a fucking word it is, so Goddamn innocent, so careless and it cuts deep — gives him pause, breathing through his nose for tense seconds, and maybe Jason notices because he goes silent. “For at least a week.”

He's still quiet when he answers, muted and controlled. Testing the waters. “Whatever will I do?”

“Sneak in?”

“The window was unlocked.” He defends. Shifts on Bruce's lap, enough that he can lean back on his bicep, and somewhat face him. “Some would call that an invitation.”

 _It was. It was. It was._ “Don't think the G.C.P.D would take your side, son.”

There's silence again, but it's not their usual. Their tense silences. This silence, this quiet, is comfortable. Jason's warm hands settling over his, tugging them tighter around his waist. His spine pressed to Bruce's arm, a soft groan coming from the boy as he lifts a leg and sets his foot over the armrest, elevated.

After what feels like forever, Jason finally speaks up. “I'm thinking of moving.”

He shouldn't ask, but it's the only important thing that comes to mind: “Out of Gotham?”

The boy snorts. “Y'know, I hear they have loads of crime in Idaho? Yeah, just buckets of it. Everyone runs wild, it's lawless out there.” He sighs wistfully. “Maybe they could do with a Red Hood. I could get my own sidekick.”

“Don't be a smartass.”

“No, I'm not moving out of Gotham.” His hands shake. Bruce stares at them, blocked out by shadow, feels the shake slow with every breath. “I was thinking the Bowery.”

He can see it, a map in his head that he knows back to front. A three-quarter mile jump east from Jason's current address; closer to the heart of Gotham, closer to Wayne Enterprise, a three-quarter mile closer to Wayne Manor. He sees it, and his chest aches something funny, controls his breathing until it's even.

“That would be good.” Is what he says, because there's nothing else he could say.

Jason's voice comes out _rough_ , hoarse. Bruce takes his mug from the desk, hands it to the boy. “Probably better for you, too. Seeing as you can't stop dragging me into your messes.”

“Yeah.”

“And I was thinking on the weekends, I could take Damian, and we could be best buds for life. Joint custody type deal, y'know?”

“Sure.”

“You really didn't hear a fucking word of that, did you?”

Bruce blinks. Puts the map away, every _for sale_ sign and every development he owns, comes back to the heavy weight across his lap. “I apologise—”

“Bullshit.” Jason snaps. He— sniffs. Bruce shifts, tries to see past the shadow his fucking stupid, too big shoulders are casting because— because Jason sniffles again, _God, God fucking— crying—_ “Am I boring you?”

“No,” if there's alarm in his voice, sue him. “Never, son.” He wants to say a lot more than that, but Jason would just leave. But, then, he always leaves. “I was thinking about what's available in the Bowery.”

The boy coughs, clears his throat. Downs half his hot chocolate in one fell swoop and inhales deeply after, foam on his mouth. “Sorry, it's this—" he sighs, dips his head. “Concussions, make me weep like a fuckin’ baby.” It's the truth. The boy's first concussion had been an event. Then, “Wait, really?”

“Yes.”

“Cool.” Jason sniffles again. “So, uh, what's available?”

“A surprising amount, given its location.”

“Being attacked every other week will do that to a neighbourhood.”

Bruce hums, not in disagreement. “One bed or two?”

Jason laughs at that. A deep, bitter sound. “Just the one, if that's your way of asking if I have a girlfriend.”

“I didn't want to presume.” There's not really a need to, anyway. As far as he knows, Jason's never— there's never been anyone. Nobody that he picked, who picked him back. “I know there's that Artemis woman, but—”

“Just me and the dog,” he cuts in, and now he's amused. There's blood on his hand when he pats Bruce's cheek. They must look like a crime scene, blood smeared all over, head to toe. “Art's nice— well, no, she's not. But she'd cut my cock off if I tried, so there's no one.”

“I'm sure she—”

“Really. With a rusted butter knife.”

“You have the nicest friends, Jason.”

Another laugh, low and quiet. But it's genuine. “You make good cocoa.” Bruce blinks, staring down beyond Jason's shoulders to his hands, one rubbing over the other.

“Rustic.” He agrees, voice thick. There's scarring across each knuckle, the mangled hands of his son, split over and over until he'd learned how to throw a punch. That was something Bruce had never had to teach him. “How are you?”

“Just dandy.” Jason sighs, a not sad, but not happy either sound. A year ago, they'd never have gotten this far. Never have passed the sniping and the blood to get here, Jason's cheek rubbing against the collar of his shirt, irritating a fading bruise. “You?”

He considers the question. He could say a lot. He could say his back isn't aching, it's agony. It's quiet in the Manor, and he hates it, like Jason's still haunting his halls. That he wants to hear that _word_ again, said so simply and comfortably that it feels real. That he wants him here, not in the fucking Bowery with a dog Bruce hasn't even _met—_

Bruce dips his head down, just close enough to press the rough stubble of his jaw to Jason's shock of hair. “Peachy. Just peachy.” Blood smears across his jaw, sticky and going cold. “Get some rest, Jay.”

Jason snorts. “Don't need to tell me twice.” He shifts, lifting his leg higher on the arm rest, leaning into Bruce's bicep — sturdy, alive, _here_ — and tucking his head beneath Bruce's chin, like they do this all the time. He wishes they did. “Night, old man.”

Bruce tightens his hold. “Goodnight, Jason.”

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are always appreciated but so is that kudos button!


End file.
